R.I.P. Three 6 Mafia's Lord Infamous

Memphis rapper Lord Infamous, a founding member of Three 6 Mafia, has died, HipHopDX reports. The news was confirmed by publicist Dove Clark. He was 40.

Born Ricky Dunigan, Infamous started Three 6 Mafia with DJ Paul (his half-brother) and Juicy J in the early 1990s. His debut solo effort Lord of Terror came out in 1994. He appeared on all of Three 6's early releases, and earlier this year, Infamous rejoined with DJ Paul, Crunchy Black, Koopsta Knicca, and Gangsta Boo to form Da Mafia 6ix. They released a mixtape, 6ix Commandments, last month.

Infamous often rapped about darker themes like the devil and the occult. In an interview, he said:

I don’t like all that chipper-ass, ring-a-ding-a-ding-ass music. I’m sayin’ that Will Smith type shit, you know? I don’t like that type of shit. And you know I liked NWA but I said I don’t wanna talk about gangbangin’. You know we got gangs here, I’m not gonna say what gang we were in but we were in a gang, but I didn’t wanna do that kind of gangbang type of thing so I said I’ma take it to another level, I’m gonna do something dark. What’s worse than a gangbanger? Evil, satan itself. So I said I’m gonna venture into that side of it and that’s how that came about.